She’d lost all track of time as she stared out at the same bleak view, and she couldn’t conjure up the will to even tab open her browser. What did it matter? What did anything matter anymore? Even her tears had dried up, spent.
“Hungry?” Bob’s voice floated into the room.
She didn’t bother turning her head, knowing Bob would be standing in the bedroom doorway. He always wore the same patient expression—calm, composed—unassailable. He was a rock when she needed soft. She didn’t bother replying and just kept watching the rain.
With a thump, a couple food tubes landed on the mattress beside her.
“The one on the left is curry,” he said. “The other is tuna-flavored. I wouldn’t try mixing them. As tantalizing as it sounds, it just doesn’t come out well.”
Gyro’s stomach gurgled in protest, but her mouth stayed closed. She pulled Nova’s hoodie tighter around her face. It still smelled like her, though the scent was getting fainter.
Bob was trying his best, but she felt like he was as much captor as friend at this point. Even though he moved silently, she knew he’d withdrawn back to his den where he’d be reading those weird blocks of paper printed all over. Books. Who owned books anymore?
If she could muster the energy, she’d be annoyed.
She had wanted to go to Nova’s, to hole up there where there would be all her sister’s stuff to keep her sane. But he wouldn’t let her out of this apartment. It’s more secure, he said. We will go gather Nova’s belongings once I feel it is safe. The job is not done yet. Even when he went out on his so-called errands, the cube’s internal network turned out to be so incredibly downgraded she couldn’t find a single port to wire into and open the locks.
So she watched the rain and remembered and tried her best to not let the huge gaping cave in her chest engulf her.
How long had she been there? Four days? Five?
Nova was dead.
No matter how many times she tried to stuff the thought down, it kept drifting back up.
Nova was dead. Prophet was dead. Chicken Fingers was dead. Even the new guy, Anansi, had bitten it.
In her little body, she fought big thoughts. People were condemned to be free, and free to be stupid. She had gotten a lot of people killed. She barely dared admit to herself that it was her fault, but she did, and it made the hole in her heart hurt a different way.
Different was good.
It just all seemed so pointless now. They’d tried so hard and paid with their lives for what?
According to Prophet, the big bad guy was still alive and all her friends weren’t.
The sun sank below the horizon. She curled up, pushing the food tubes aside, and slept. Endless dreams played in her head of chasing Nova through halls lined with vat after vat, each gene-tube holding a half-grown body of her dead sister. Except when she caught her, Nova turned around to reveal a face of flame. The flames flowed over Nova’s body, melting the flesh away until nothing but an ashen skeleton remained that reached out to embrace Gyro …
Jenny … the ghost image cried out, using her long-abandoned birth name.
She woke, gasping, bedsheets soaked through. Another sunrise washed filthy, speckled yellow light over her. Blinking against this, she sat up, pushing the crumpled blankets away. The unused food tubes were gone. Sometime during the night, Bob had tended to her, cleaning up and leaving fresh bottles of water next to her bed.
She resumed her vigil before the window. She didn’t know what she expected to see outside. She just wasn’t quite done with the world sucking yet.
Her stomach rumbled again, and a spear of pain shot through her guts.
A query popped up on her TAP, blinking to request access.
Gyro sat back on the bed and stared at it. Billy. There were only two private feeds that connected directly to her TAP. Billy had never used the direct route to her before. She tabbed to accept the query.
The window vanished, and a new text-only readout appeared.
@Billy_Black_Eyes: Hey, kid. We’re back in action!
@Gyrosammich: Great. I don’t want any part of it.
@Billy_Black_Eyes: Aw, hey now. You could act a little more enthused. You should hear what I went through to get patched back in.
@Gyrosammich: You should hear how everything went straight to shit on our end.
@Billy_Black_Eyes: Actually, I already did. And there’s something you don’t know yet.
@Gyrosammich: Yah? Been talking to the Bobmeister already?
@Billy_Black_Eyes: Nope. Been hearing straight from the source. Nothing ended up being what we thought it was. Oh the shit we didn’t know! Speaking of which, she should be joining us any second now.
@Gyroammich: She?
A new tag entered the channel.
@Nova2.0: Hello, hon. Are you ready for what comes next?
About the Authors
Author and editor Josh Vogt has been published in dozens of genre markets with work ranging across fantasy, science fiction, horror, humor, pulp, and more. He also writes for a wide variety of RPG developers. His debut fantasy novel, Forge of Ashes, is a tie-in to the Pathfinder roleplaying game. WordFire Press launched his urban fantasy series, The Cleaners, with Enter the Janitor and The Maids of Wrath. He’s an editor at Paizo, a member of SFWA, and the International Association of Media Tie-In Writers, and is also a Scribe Award and Compton Crook Award finalist.
Find him at JRVogt.com or on Twitter @JRVogt.
He is made out of meat.
Guy Anthony De Marco is a speculative fiction author; a Graphic Novel Bram Stoker Award finalist; winner of the HWA Silver Hammer Award; a prolific short story and flash fiction crafter; a novelist; an invisible man with superhero powers; a game writer (Sojourner Tales modules, Interface Zero 2.0 core team, D&D modules); and a coffee addict. One of these is false.
Guy is a member of the following organizations: SFWA, WWA, SFPA, IAMTW, ASCAP, RMFW, HWA. He hopes to collect the rest of the letters of the alphabet one day.
Peter J. Wacks was purportedly born in California sometime during 1976. He has always been amazed and fascinated by both writing and the absurdity of the world in general. Throughout the course of his life, he has hitchhiked across the States and backpacked across Europe on the Eurail. Peter writes a lot and will continue to do so till the day he dies. Possibly beyond.
He is a cross-genre writer who has worked in various capacities across the creative fields in gaming, television, film, comics, and most recently, when not busy editing, he spends his time writing novels.
He has been a panelist, guest speaker, and Guest of Honor at a combined total of over 250 conventions, Trade Shows, Organizations, and Colleges—including GAMA, Mensa Colorado, and UCLA.
When he isn’t working on the next book, he can be found practicing martial arts, playing chess, drinking Scotch or IPA, or fighting with swords.
If You Liked …
If you liked Solar Singularity, you might also enjoy:
Club Anyone
Lou Agresta
Empire’s Rift
Steve Rzasa
Lunatic City
T. Allen Diaz
Other WordFire Press Titles by Peter J. Wacks
Second Paradigm
Bloodletting with Mark Ryan
The Dandy Boys Mysteries with J.R. Boyett
Josh Vogt
Enter the Janitor
The Maids of Wrath
The Dustpan Cometh
Our list of other WordFire Press authors and titles is always growing. To find out more and to see our selection of titles, visit us at:
wordfirepress.com
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